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Way into Encountering God in Judaism »

Book cover image of Way into Encountering God in Judaism by Neil Gillman

Authors: Neil Gillman
ISBN-13: 9781580231992, ISBN-10: 1580231993
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Jewish Lights Publishing
Date Published: February 2004
Edition: (Non-applicable)

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Author Biography: Neil Gillman

Book Synopsis

Neil Gillman explains how Jews have encountered God throughout Jewish history--and today--by exploring the many images of God in Jewish tradition, how they originated, and what they can mean for us. Accompanying award-winning author Gillman on a journey through the Hebrew Bible, rabbinic literature and the Jewish prayer book, we explore the Jewish tradition's passionate, but also conflicting ways of relating to God as:

  • Creator
  • Relational partner
  • Force in history and nature

Publishers Weekly

This audacious exploration of the Jewish concept of God squarely faces many contradictions and conundrums. Gillman, a professor of Jewish philosophy at Jewish Theological Seminary, won the National Jewish Book Award for Sacred Fragments: Recovering Theology for the Modern Jew. He begins by asking how humans can describe God if He is ultimately unknowable. Our common conception of God in human terms is metaphorical thinking, according to Gillman; when it comes to actual knowledge, "we are all agnostics. We know nothing." Moreover, "there is no way of proving objectively and conclusively that God exists." Gillman's ensuing discussion of monotheism leads to the paradox that God is simultaneously powerful and vulnerable--caring and loving, but also distant and cruel. Gillman cautions that since we cannot know God's essence, these attributes represent our own feelings. He explores human suffering through creative analyses of the Book of Job, the martyrdom of Rabbi Akiva and the Holocaust, leading to the admittedly unsatisfactory conclusion that acts of God are "beyond human understanding." Finally, Gillman takes up revelation and redemption, considering the issue of the Jews as the "chosen people" and juxtaposing liberal with traditionalist views. His examination of texts brings him to accept inconsistencies and to highlight discrepancies between popular images of God and God's portrayal in classical Jewish sources. Gillman has made a significant contribution here. (Mar.) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Table of Contents

About The Way Into...i
Timelinevi
Acknowledgmentsxv
A Note on the Textxix
Introduction1
Can people know anything about God?
Can people say anything about God?
Worshipful silence or metaphorical language?
The sin of idolatry: worshiping the image instead of God
We discover God and create the metaphors
Can we be sure that it is God that we discover?
1.God Is Echad17
The Shema: What does it mean?
One and not two, or unique?
Maimonides on God's integrity
Can love be commanded?
Israel loves God, and God loves Israel
Living in a world under one God
God is not yet Echad
God is lonely
2.God Is Power33
God's power is unchallenged
God even creates evil and reverses the course of nature
There are restraints on God's power: human freedom and the possibilities of repentance
God's power in nature and God's power in history
God's eventual defeat of death
3.God Is Person51
Two questions: "Where are you?" and "Where is your brother?"
God searches for us as we search for God
God's vulnerability
The hidden face of God
God as spouse, parent, and lover
The wrath of God
Anger versus abandonment
God weeps
God as person or God as process
God can be moved
4.God Is Nice (Sometimes)71
Tensions in the Jewish image of God
How Psalms shaped the Jewish consciousness
God as nurturing, as refuge, and as rock
God heals what ails us
The issue of feminist God-language
God is a teacher
5.God Is Not Nice (Sometimes)89
The "down" images of God
From feelings to metaphors
The challenge of the Book of Job
Is God ethical?
The death of Rabbi Akiva
The problem of human suffering
Holocaust theology
The legitimacy of unbelief
The death of God
A liturgical challenge to God
6.God Can Change109
Can God really change?
What changes?
How God deals with human sinfulness: the evolution of a doctrine
Sin is punished immediately, but the punishment must be just and it may be deferred
Repentance enters the picture
The message of the Book of Jonah
The Thirteen Attributes of God in the Bible and in the liturgy
Unetaneh Tokef: the development of a metaphor
7.God Creates127
The triad: creation, revelation, redemption
We are partners with God in all three
Four understandings of creation: as order out of anarchy, as anthropocentric, as the result of a primordial combat, as renewed daily and perpetually
From the Bible to the liturgy
Why four accounts?
God is not the conclusion but the point of departure
8.God Reveals145
The principle of revelation and the fact of revelation
Does God choose Israel?
The content of revelation: the traditional position and three liberal interpretations
The image of God in each of these
We are partners with God in revelation
God in Exodus and God in the Joseph narrative
Heteronomy versus autonomy
9.God Redeems165
To redeem is to save
From history to eschatology
The eschatological impulse
Three dimensions of Jewish eschatology: the universal, the national, and the individual
God's triumph over death
The world as not yet redeemed
We are partners with God in redemption
Repairing the world
God as the power that makes for salvation
Epilogue185
Notes187
Glossary191
Suggestions for Further Reading199
Index201
About Jewish Lights Publishing206

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